[LINK] another dangerous IT system fail

[Jan Whitaker]

At 09:33 AM 1/04/2014, Bernard Robertson-Dunn you wrote:

>Health information is too important to be left to technologists.

Yeah, I was going to say that, but thought better of it. ;-) 
Including human systems analysts is a must. It's not about the tools; 
it's about the design, which includes ALL the factors, not just the 
'information', but also human behaviour and implementation planning.

In regard to this project, the article doesn't provide enough detail 
as to who was directing it. If it was totally subcontracted, their 
systems people failed. If the health bureaucracy had their hands in 
it, then they missed out some critical aspects they should have known 
better, e.g. sending out the letters and expecting they would be 
understood. I place that goof at their feet as it is highly unlikely 
that the systems implementers, subcontractors or otherwise, would 
have been involved with sending letters.

The one about not accounting for staff holidays was something BOTH 
sides (client and provider) should have found in any testing if they 
had done it properly. That was negligence or incompetence or being 
overwhelmed by a complex system that wasn't well analysed.

What always gets me about these problems is that they are not new. 
Booking systems should be pretty standard by now. That they screwed 
this up tells me that Austin Health bought lowest bid tender and 
didn't consider some critical aspect, like if the staff from the 
provider had done a booking system before (unknown to us). Note: "the 
staff". Just because a company has done something in the past is not 
adequate information if the staff turnover is "common" or if the 
provider is subcontracting to a third party. QA is stuffed. And this 
relates to an even broader issue: outsourcing IT management and not 
having in-house expertise with corporate knowledge available. I don't 
know this to be the case at Austin, but you gotta wonder about the 
capabilities they had if this was a mess. More cost cutting??

I agree with your sentiment that health services (especially direct 
care provision) must have a higher threshold of quality assurance. 
Unfortunately, too many decision makers just don't understand that.

Jan



Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
jwhit at janwhitaker.com

Sooner or later, I hate to break it to you, you're gonna die, so how 
do you fill in the space between here and there? It's yours. Seize your space.
~Margaret Atwood, writer

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